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Pentagons
A break from hexagons to make a gift for a baby. It’s useful to have a mathematician husband who tells you, just as you blindly set off the wrong path, that you cannot make a ball with only hexagons…...
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Green eggs (and ham?)
A marvelous surprise awaited our return from a few days back in Switzerland. Our first green egg from ‘Brownie’! Clever little South American hen… I must order the Dr Seuss book of that same title for...
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Chicken Quilt
Chickens… Quilts… What can I say? It had to happen. You can blame one of my wonderful doctoral students who gave me two pieces of chicken-themed fabric from a shop in Amsterdam. Don’t I have great...
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Some are just larger
Oh you poor hen, I feel your pain… Easter is just around the corner (and yes that is a jar if Christmas Mincemeat peeping out on the right that we really should eat!). Happy laying! Or not. JJ
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Songs of Spring
Just in case anyone was wondering, I’m still here. Much less sewing than I thought, much more life. Children now fluent in Italian. Lots of pony and horse riding. Chickens, too. A rotten sickness over...
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Heavens this is bright
I have never made a quilt you need sunglasses for… This will clearly be one! Top almost pieced — here it is all laid out. The fabric between the bright patterned fabric was hand dyed with Procion...
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Chasing chickens
I understand why farmers never go on holiday: we just spent half an hour retrieving escaped chickens roosting around the garden, at midnight, after four days away in Rome. The schools had closed for...
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Just mindlessly sewing
Nothing like picking up fabric and thread and just mindlessly sewing. “Mamaaaa? What are you making?” ” I have no idea”. totally stalled on all real projects. I was floating the idea of organising a...
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Finishing up
When you really should be packing up to move back to another country, but you can’t really face it on your birthday, you can always just grab a sewing machine and quickly appliqué that half-finished...
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Back on track
A summer of moving furniture, pets and people backwards and forwards, and back to Switzerland. Children adapt so easily, me not so well. But I’m starting to feel settled back into crazy work routines....
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Quilt Camp
Quilt camp is a rare once-a-year treat with precious friends: no classes, nothing planned, just a big bag of ‘well I might feel like making that’ projects, spontaneous meals, dress code: pyjamas, and...
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Crazy colours
The rain pitter-patted all night on the roof, but I was cozy under the zany coloured quilt that I quilted last night. I put the binding on this morning. Crazy colours, hand dyed fabric between the...
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Back sewing!
A great treat to be back in a chalet in Morzine, in the French Alps, sewing sewing sewing. Finally. Nothing beats a retreat to carve out time and mental space. Some projects I brought along to work on...
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Hand-pieced hexagons
So much quicker than paper-piecing, and just as portable once you’ve cut out the shapes: piecing hexagons by hand. Duh. I’m not sure why it took me quite so long to work this out? I had tried...
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Back in Tuscany…
After a year back in Switzerland, with downs and ups, we are back in our beloved Tuscany for the summer. There was one thing missing in the house. That is now sorted! Rather than agonise over options,...
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Sewing with children
A lovely way to escape the hot Tuscan midday sun with a 10 yr-old daughter and 7yr-old son. We all love my new machine! Happy times. JJ
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Boxes
We are moving, within the city, tomorrow! I will have a sewing room! Beyond excited… So much to pack, so much to unpack. Our third summer in a row moving, but hopefully the last for a while. And...
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Home!
The heavens welcomed us home. So, so very lucky to be able to move. My new sewing room (!!!!) had crazy splotches on the wall where the previous owners filled up holes. I won’t have time to paint...
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Totally fabulous days
Spending a weekend sewing up a mountain in lovely company, one week into an academic term, was just perfection! What fun we had! It was the 10th edition of the now-famous Patchwork in the Peaks, led by...
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